0000000001317887
AUTHOR
Fabián Bonilla
Hydrology Affects Environmental and Spatial Structuring of Microalgal Metacommunities in Tropical Pacific Coast Wetlands
The alternating climate between wet and dry periods has important effects on the hydrology and therefore on niche-based processes of water bodies in tropical areas. Additionally, assemblages of microorganism can show spatial patterns, in the form of a distance decay relationship due to their size or life form. We aimed to test spatial and environmental effects, modulated by a seasonal flooding climatic pattern, on the distribution of microalgae in 30 wetlands of a tropical dry forest region: the Pacific coast of Costa Rica and Nicaragua. Three surveys were conducted corresponding to the beginning, the highest peak, and the end of the hydrological year during the wet season, and species abun…
Metacommunities from bacteria to birds: stronger environmental selection in mediterranean than in tropical ponds
AbstractThe metacommunity concept provides a theoretical framework that aims at explaining organism distributions by a combination of environmental filtering, dispersal and drift. With the development of statistical tools to quantify and partially isolate the role of each of these processes, empirical metacommunity studies have multiplied worldwide. However, few works attempt a multi-taxon approach and even fewer compare two distant biogeographical regions using the same methodology. Under this framework, we tested the expectation that temperate (mediterranean-climate) pond metacommunities would be more influenced by environmental and spatial processes than tropical ones, because of stronge…
Environment and Space Rule, but Time also Matters for the Organization of Tropical Pond Metacommunities
Metacommunities are dynamic systems, but the influence of time independently of environmental change in their configuration has been rarely considered. Temporary ponds are excellent ecosystem models, as they have well-defined boundaries in time and space; their communities are relatively isolated through a landscape matrix, and the progress of time leads to major changes through ecological succession and in habitat suitability related to hydroperiod dynamics. Therefore, strong temporal effects are expected to influence their metacommunity structure. We surveyed 30 temporary ponds along the dry tropical region of western Costa Rica and Nicaragua at three different moments of their hydroperio…
Base de datos de variables geográficas y limnológicas de 30 lagunas someras de la costa pacífica de Nicaragua y Costa Rica [Dataset]
Esta base de datos contiene los valores de 24 variables (geográficas y limnológicas) de 30 lagunas costeras de la costa pacífica de Nicaragua y Costa Rica en tres periodos de su año hidrológico: comienzo de las lluvias (junio 2010), plena inundación (septiembre 2010) y sequía (enero 2011). En esta matriz de datos las filas son los cuerpos de agua muestreados y las columnas las variables. Cada periodo hidrológico muestreado se presenta en una hoja aparte. Descripción de estas lagunas basada en esta y en otra información se puede encontrar en Sasa et al. (2015: Limnetica vol 34).